Agunah Revisited: How To Avoid High Conflict Divorce

May 19, 2026

AI Summary

5 min read

In a recent episode of the 18Forty Podcast, host David Bashevkin revisits the topic of agunot—women chained in Jewish marriages because their husbands refuse to give a get (a Jewish divorce document). Rather than focusing solely on the halakhic mechanics of divorce, the conversation centers on a more practical question: why do so many Jewish divorces escalate into high-conflict battles, and what can be done to prevent that? The episode brings together three experts—Sarah Nissel and Yonah Elbaz of the Jewish Divorce Assistance Center (JDAC) in Los Angeles, and Keshet Starr of Shalom Task Force—to explore the frameworks, red flags, and interventions that can keep a divorce from becoming a crisis.

Marriage as a Starting Line, Not a Finish Line

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What you'll learn

1 (04:19) **Introduction: Revisiting the Agunah Issue** - Host David Bashevkin frames the episode as a re-exploration of chained marriages (agunot) within Jewish law.
2 (17:27) **Marriage as a Starting Line, Not a Finish Line** - Sarah Nissel reframes the communal view of marriage, arguing it is the beginning of a journey, not the end goal.
3 (20:13) **How J-DAC’s Mediation Process Works** - Yonah Elishis and Sarah Nissel detail the intake and structure of their free divorce mediation service.
4 (26:13) **Common Points of Contention: Finances and Children** - The mediators identify the most frequent and emotionally charged issues couples fight over.
5 (33:45) **Red Flags for High-Conflict Divorce** - The experts outline the warning signs that predict a divorce will become destructive and unmanageable.
6 (37:42) **The Get as Collateral: A Critical Point of Leverage** - The conversation tackles the sensitive issue of using the Jewish divorce document (get) as a bargaining chip in civil negotiations.
7 (55:20) **Keshet Starr on the Catalysts for High-Conflict Divorce** - Keshet Starr from Shalom Task Force explains why the Orthodox community’s divorce rate, while low, has a 59% high-conflict rate.

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Guests on this episode

David Bashevkin

Show Notes

In this episode of the 18Forty Podcast, we revisit the topic of agunot by talking to Sarah Nissel and Yona Elishis, who run the Jewish Divorce Assistance Center of Los Angeles.

We’re also joined by Keshet Starr, CEO of Shalom Task Force. In this episode we discuss:

How do potentially amicable divorces escalate to being high-conflict?
Why does adversarial divorce seem to be increasingly common in the Jewish community?
What do experts in the area of agunot think of the related social-media movements?

Tune in to hear a conversation about the integrity of our marriages in the Jewish community.

Interview begins at 15:16.
Keshet Starr joins at 53:20.

Sarah M. Nissel is the founding Executive Director of the Jewish Divorce Assistance Center and a visiting professor of law and religion at Pepperdine Caruso school of law, where she leads the Faith & Family Mediation Clinic. A Yale and NYU Law graduate, she previously worked in white-collar and complex litigation, served at the Innocence Project, and now lives in Los Angeles with her husband and four children.

Yona Elishis is a family law mediator and Adjunct Clinical Professor at Pepperdine Caruso School of Law, where she teaches in the Faith & Family Mediation Clinic in partnership with the Jewish Divorce Assistance Center of Los Angeles (JDAC). Trained at Osgoode Hall Law School, Columbia Law School, and New York University School of Law, she previously practiced family and corporate law in Toronto and New York and now lives in Los Angeles with her husband and five children.

Keshet Starr is the CEO of Shalom Task Force, which works to combat and prevent domestic abuse in the Jewish community. Previously, she led the Organization for the Resolution of Agunot. She lives in Hillside, New Jersey, with her family.

References:

Strangers: A Memoir of Marriage by Belle Burden

See What You Made Me Do: Power, Control and Domestic Violence by Jess Hill

Marriage Story (2019)

Gett (2014)

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